Jennifer Myers

The accused was tried on multiple sexual and child-exploitation charges arising from online communications and an in-person meeting with a 15-year-old complainant.

The court found the Crown proved, through circumstantial evidence, device evidence, matching BBM pin data, screenshots, and a recorded call, that the accused was the online communicator, knew the complainant's age, sent sexually explicit material, lured the complainant, possessed and distributed child pornography, invited sexual touching, and attempted to procure the complainant for sexual services.

The court rejected the complainant's evidence on the alleged in-person touching because of serious credibility and reliability concerns, including exaggerations, contradictions with surveillance video, and motive to fabricate, and entered acquittals on sexual assault and sexual interference.

Findings of guilt were entered on the remaining counts subject to conditional or election-based stays for overlapping offences.

The applicant, charged with manslaughter, applied for bail.

The Crown opposed release on the secondary and tertiary grounds.

The court found that while the secondary ground concerns were substantial, they could be adequately mitigated by a strict release plan involving two sureties, house arrest conditions, and random drug testing.

The court also concluded that detention was not necessary on the tertiary ground.

The application for release was granted.

K.A. sought a review of his detention on two sets of criminal charges: criminal organization/trafficking and aggravated assault.

The court granted release on the criminal organization and trafficking charges with conditions, including electronic monitoring and a surety.

However, detention was maintained for the aggravated assault charge due to overwhelming concerns on both secondary (risk to public safety given extensive violent history and nature of the index offense) and tertiary grounds (maintaining confidence in the administration of justice).

The defendants brought a Garofoli application seeking to exclude evidence seized from an apartment pursuant to a search warrant, alleging breaches of their s. 8 Charter rights.

The court found that while a police officer's warrantless entry to 'freeze' the apartment violated s. 8, the breach was committed in good faith and did not warrant exclusion of evidence under s. 24(2).

After reviewing the Information to Obtain (ITO) and making necessary excisions, the court concluded that the redacted ITO, amplified by a judicial summary of confidential informant information, provided sufficient reliable evidence for the issuing justice to grant the warrant.

The application was dismissed.

The applicant was arrested for possession of a firearm after a loaded gun was found in an apartment she shared with her son.

At the police station, she was subjected to a Level 3 strip search, which included the removal of her underwire bra.

She brought a Charter application arguing the search violated her s. 8 rights.

The Superior Court of Justice found that the police lacked reasonable and probable grounds for the strip search, as it was conducted as a matter of routine policy rather than on a case-by-case basis.

Given the serious and systemic nature of the police misconduct in disregarding established law on strip searches, the court concluded that a stay of proceedings was the only appropriate remedy under s. 24(1) of the Charter to preserve the integrity of the justice system.

The accused brought a Charter application to exclude drug evidence found on his person during an arrest.

The police officers claimed they detained the accused because he was walking in a manner that suggested he was concealing a firearm.

The court found the officers' testimony lacked credibility and concluded the accused was targeted due to his perceived gang affiliation.

The court held that the detention, arrest, and subsequent search were unlawful, violating the accused's rights under ss. 8, 9, and 10(a) of the Charter.

The officers also used excessive force and lied to the accused about the reason for his detention.

Applying the Grant framework, the court excluded the evidence under s. 24(2) of the Charter, citing the officers' bad faith and deliberate disregard for the accused's Charter rights.

The accused was charged with attempted robbery, forcible confinement, assault, and weapons offences after a dispute over escort services.

The accused paid $300 for services but, feeling he was deceived by a 'bait and switch', demanded his money back while waving an imitation firearm (a BB gun).

The court found the evidence of the principal witnesses unreliable and acquitted the accused of attempted robbery and forcible confinement.

However, the court found the accused guilty of the lesser included offence of constructive assault with an imitation firearm, as well as failing to comply with a bail condition prohibiting weapons possession.

The appellant abandoned his conviction appeal and proceeded only with a sentence appeal.

The appellate court found that the trial judge had been misinformed regarding the amount of pre-sentence custody credit available, resulting in an understatement of credit by two months.

Leave to appeal sentence was granted, and the pre-sentence custody credit was adjusted from the original calculation to 27.5 months against a three-year sentence, resulting in a net sentence of 8.5 months.

The accused was found guilty of multiple offences, including discharging a firearm, aggravated assault, and dangerous operation of a vehicle, after firing 13 shots into a residential townhouse and subsequently engaging in a high-speed police pursuit.

A 10-year-old child sleeping inside the home was struck by a bullet.

The court dismissed a Kienapple application regarding the discharge firearm and aggravated assault counts, finding insufficient legal nexus.

Emphasizing denunciation and deterrence for gun violence, the court imposed a global sentence of 12.5 years imprisonment, less 4 years of enhanced credit for pre-trial custody, resulting in 8.5 years left to serve.

During a murder trial, the accused brought a mid-trial application to admit an additional portion of a deceased witness's video-recorded statement under the principled exception to the hearsay rule.

The Crown opposed the admission.

The court found that while necessity was established, the statement lacked threshold reliability due to unmitigated hearsay dangers related to perception and narration.

The application was dismissed and the evidence was ruled inadmissible.

The applicant applied to reopen and reconsider a prior ruling that his post-arrest confession to two murders was voluntary.

The application was based on the subsequent exclusion of internet search queries under s. 24(2) of the Charter, which had been put to the applicant during his police interview.

The court dismissed the application, finding no material change in circumstances because the police acted in good faith using a presumptively valid warrant at the time of the interview.

The court concluded that the subsequent inadmissibility of the evidence did not render the police conduct oppressive or affect the voluntariness of the statement.

The applicants brought a pre-trial application to excise certain passages from transcripts of intercepted private communications, arguing the audio was inaudible and the transcripts would prejudice the jury.

The court dismissed the application, applying established law that the audio recordings are the evidence and the jury may use the transcripts as an aid.

The court found that the jury, properly instructed, could resolve disputes about the accuracy of the transcripts by listening to the recordings and considering cross-examination.

The co-accused applied to sever a second-degree murder count from two first-degree murder counts on the same indictment.

The co-accused argued that the stronger evidence on the first two counts, including a confession, would cause moral and reasoning prejudice on the third count, where the cause of death was disputed.

The court dismissed the application, finding a strong factual and legal nexus between the counts, as all three deceased were members of the same family involved in an ongoing child custody dispute.

The court also found that count-to-count similar fact evidence was likely admissible to prove identity, and that the interests of justice, including avoiding a multiplicity of proceedings, favoured a joint trial.

The applicants, charged with first-degree murder, brought an omnibus motion under s. 24(2) of the Charter to exclude three categories of evidence obtained through various s. 8 Charter breaches: a PDF of a lock found on a cellphone, banking records, and internet search queries found on a laptop.

The court applied the Grant framework to each category.

The court admitted the PDF evidence, finding the police acted in good faith and the breach was at the lower end of the seriousness scale.

The court excluded the banking records, finding the production order was overbroad and based on a misleading Information to Obtain (ITO).

The court also excluded the internet search queries, finding a pattern of police misconduct, including misleading testimony, alteration of investigative records, and failure to disclose unauthorized access to the applicants' email accounts, which severely impacted the applicants' Charter-protected interests and would bring the administration of justice into disrepute if admitted.

This ruling addresses whether the applicants, Melissa Merritt and Christopher Fattore, had a reasonable expectation of privacy (REP) in data stored on a 'loaner phone' provided by police after their original phone was seized.

The court applied the totality of circumstances test, considering the subject matter (data), the applicants' interest in it, their subjective expectation, and its objective reasonableness.

The court found that the applicants did have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the personal data on the loaner phone, primarily because police had previously informed Ms. Merritt that a warrant would be required to access data on their seized family phone, fostering a reasonable belief that the same protection would apply to the replacement device.

The accused, charged with first-degree murder, challenged the admissibility of his 15-hour post-arrest video-recorded statement to police.

He alleged violations of his s. 10(b) right to counsel, his s. 7 right to silence, and argued the confession was involuntary due to police oppression and inducements regarding his common-law spouse and children.

The court found no s. 10(b) breach, as the accused accepted duty counsel advice without requesting a specific lawyer.

Applying the Oickle framework, the court held the confession was voluntary beyond a reasonable doubt.

The police did not offer a quid pro quo or overbear the accused's will; rather, the accused made a calculated choice to confess in hopes of assisting his spouse, a motive that was largely self-generated.

The statement was ruled admissible.

The applicants, charged with first-degree murder, brought a preliminary screening motion to determine whether they could adduce evidence of additional alleged Charter violations on their upcoming s. 24(2) application.

They sought to introduce evidence of violations of third parties' rights, other violations of their own rights, and unconstitutional police practices in unrelated investigations to establish a 'pattern of abuse' under Grant.

The court held the applicants lacked standing to assert third-party rights and rejected evidence of unrelated police practices.

For the applicants' own rights, the court permitted evidence of additional violations only where they met the Goldhart nexus test or had sufficient probative value to demonstrate a pattern of abuse without consuming disproportionate judicial resources.

The applicants, charged with multiple murders, brought an application to exclude electronic intercepts and tracking warrant evidence, alleging violations of section 8 of the Charter.

The application challenged the necessity of judicial authorization for police email exchanges in an undercover operation, the police's actions in repacking belongings containing listening devices, and the validity of a tracking warrant based on alleged material errors and omissions in the information to obtain.

The court dismissed the application, finding no reasonable expectation of privacy in the email communications, that police actions regarding the trailer were within the scope of implied invitation, and that the tracking warrant was valid.

The applicants, charged with first-degree murder, brought a Charter application alleging s. 8 violations regarding the search of a trailer on their property and the subsequent warrantless seizure and technological examination of laptops and USB drives found inside.

The court held that the initial search of the trailer was lawfully executed because police took control of the premises within the time specified in the warrant.

The warrantless seizure of the electronic devices was justified under s. 489 of the Criminal Code as the officers had reasonable grounds to believe they would afford evidence.

However, the court found s. 8 violations occurred when an officer conducted a warrantless preview of a USB drive, when the subsequent search warrant failed to authorize a technological examination, and when detention orders were improperly extended.

This pre-trial application addressed the admissibility of expert testimony on urban street gangs, evidence of prior violent incidents, and YouTube videos in a murder trial.

The Crown sought to introduce this evidence to establish motive related to inter-gang rivalry.

The court applied the Mohan criteria and a cost/benefit analysis, ruling that expert evidence on general gang phenomena and specific incidents was admissible, but with limitations on ultimate issues and hearsay.

Initially, some videos were admitted, but this ruling was reversed after the accused made admissions regarding gang existence and membership, as the videos' probative value was then outweighed by their prejudice.

A subsequent application by the Crown to re-admit videos during cross-examination of an accused was also refused, upholding the principle against compelling an accused to put character in issue.